Ibn al-Athir

Timeline

1. 1160–1171Mosul · IraqBorn in Mosul into a family of scholars, with father and brother both well-known scholars, he was exposed from childhood in a household learning environment to the Quran, literature, and the basics of historiography.
2. 1171–1180Mosul · IraqDuring this period, roughly ages eleven to twenty, he studied historiography, hadith, and literature in Mosul under his father and brother, personally experiencing the political upheavals in the Jazira region before and after the rise of Saladin, laying the scholarly foundation for his later historical compilations.
3. 1180–1233Mosul · IraqAs an adult he compiled al-Kamil fi al-Tarikh, a chronological account of history from creation to his own time, with particularly detailed coverage of the Crusades and the Ayyubid period, making it one of the most important sources for studying the medieval Islamic world.